1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the invention relate generally to the strategic and tactical decision-making required for the delivery of complex systems. More particularly, embodiments of the invention relate to methods and software tools supporting strategic and tactical decision-making aimed at requirements, solutions and deployments.
2. Background Art
Managing and delivering a complex system require the proper understanding of which requirements, solutions, and deployments are applicable as well as the relationships and dependencies between those requirements, solutions and deployments. The scale and complexity of these requirements, solutions and deployments and their relationships and dependencies often overwhelm the human decision-maker. Additionally, a project generally requires many stakeholders or decision-makers (e.g., users, customers, project managers, system administrators, solution designers, solution providers/builders, vendors, testers, architects, etc.), with each contributing valuable input to the requirements, design, development, testing, deployment, and maintenance of the complex system. For example, these stakeholders must: (a) determine the scope and detail of requirements to capture, document and measure the system by; (b) forecast and assess individual customers or market needs at given times, available technology solutions, and the overall requirements for the system including functional requirements, data requirements, timing requirements, non-functional requirements, and installation requirements; (c) identify and plan for the scope of requirements to be delivered and satisfied within respective system releases and system deployments; (d) evaluate and compare technology solutions options; (e) determine which technology solutions to buy, reuse, or develop; (f) configure, evaluate and select technology solutions that best satisfy functional requirements, compatibility/integration with each other, non-functional requirements, marketplace needs or the limits of the customer's actual resources. In addition, these stakeholders typically are geographically distributed and varied in expertise. Miscommunication and misunderstandings between stakeholders can have adverse effects on the success of the project.
In short, current systems and methods are inadequate for managing, relating, and communicating the requirements, solutions, and deployments associated with large, complex projects in a manner that satisfies the decision-making needs of stakeholders with different perspectives and expertise.